On Bullets and Brakelights
by vaudevillain king
Summary: Drunk driving, philosophy and death. The then and the now. [Mello and Matt. Songfic. Rated for language.]


I've been feeling angsty lately.  
Hence, this fic. 

I had some trouble deciding what song to use.  
I finally decided on _The Highway Song_ by System of a Down.

Mello and Matt belong to Ohba-san and Obata-san.  
_The Highway Song_ is SoaD's.

Onward!

* * *

The radio throbbed static noise that eventually turned out to be a song, and it was all he bothered hearing outside the screech of tires and the beating of his heart against his ribcage. 

He knew the song.

_I need, I feel the love  
You love to love the fear_

The car spiraled and he clung to the wheel, making the turn and finding, aggravatingly enough, that Takada's bodyguards were still behind him.

And he'd dared to hope they'd just disappear.

Inhaling smoke, Matt glared through orange lenses and stomped on the gas pedal.

He remembered Mello doing the same, what was it now, months ago?

Mello showing up at his door two years after he disappeared without a trace, gnawing a chocolate bar, silver crucifixes dangling from his wrists and neck like shackles or good luck charms. Mello having a plan, as always, wanting Matt's help.

Something about buying a sniper rifle and tracking a mafia boss down in the middle of Los Angeles.

Some things never change.

_I never wanna be alone  
I've forgotten, too  
_  
And of course, during all the in-between moments, when Kira and Near and wins and losses grew too irritating to look for or care about, they got drunk. 

It would explain the raging headache Matt had throbbing just behind his eyes as he whipped the car, scuffed and red, around another  
turn. There, no more bodyguards.

_The road keeps moving the clouds  
The clouds become unreal_

He remembered asking Mello where he got the car.

After Mello mentioned a handgun and a very convenient place for hitchhiking at the side of the highway, Matt decided questions were better left unasked.

He maintained this philosophy even when Mello dragged him to some warehouse outside of Vegas and left him waiting in the car while _he blew up the goddamn building_.

Somehow, cleaning up the seared skin on Mello's face, Matt really wasn't surprised.

_I guess I'll always be at home  
Do you want me to try  
directing your night? _

Matt bit his lip around his cigarette as black cars sped out of nowhere and into the beams of his headlights.

Where does she _get_ all these guys?

_An exit lights the sky  
The sky becomes complete_

Knowing what came next, Matt grabbed for the gun sitting on the passenger seat that was so often his place. Somehow, all he heard was that goddamn song, and echoing behind it was Mello, voice somehow lucid in spite of alcohol.

Memories.

Blonde hair tumbling ragged in his face, Mello's grin was plastered manic, and his eyes were glowing. They'd been driving for hours, nowhere to nowhere. It wasn't about where. They didn't need the radio even though it was on; Mello was too busy talking.

_Friction, lines, bumps  
The Highway Song complete_

"It's about living, Matt."

"Yeah?"

"It's about- no, listen, it's about holding on to what you can and taking everything that belongs to anybody else. You gotta, you gotta punch and kick and bite and fuck everything you can while you can because if you don't do it to someone else, they're gonna do it to you."

Matt smoked and wondered if he really should have let Mello have that fifth shot of vodka mixed with something that smelled – and probably tasted – like gasoline.

Since he ditched his Slav accent at ten, Mello's drinking habits were probably the only thing that gave away his heritage.

Well, that and his teeth.

"It's about God, and I mean _God_, not what people say God is, like that shithead who thinks he can go waving His almighty book around like it's his own personal fax from Christ himself, just cuz he gets a fancy house and a big pointy fuck hat. He wears a dress for fuck's sake. Like,_ God_, Matt."

Mello swerved slightly over the white line striping the middle of the road. The street was empty, and Matt said nothing.

He never did, even when Mello stormed out, fourteen and angry and telling no one where he went, even after Matt followed him.

_The signs are all turning right  
Do you want me to try  
directing your night?_

Maybe it was because he knew, somehow, that Mello would come barreling back in.

He didn't, of course, know it would be at sixteen, or grown into a mess of skin-tight leather and overblown libido, toting a gun and a grudge against anyone who breathed at him funny.

And, of course, a drunken philosophy on life.

"God isn't something people can control, and people can't say that they know what God thinks. God loves whoever the fuck he wants to, and kills the shit out of anyone he doesn't. God doesn't hate black people, God doesn't hate Mexicans, God doesn't fucking hate gays. People hate those things. Because people…"

Mello swerved again, and this time there were oncoming headlights to swerve away.

"People are flawed."

A big, balding man sat in the driver's seat of the oncoming car, and flipped them off as he passed.

Matt lunged to grab the steering wheel as Mello returned the gesture, two handed.

"Yeah, spin on it, you big ugly shit! —Matt, hey, _I'm_ driving."

Bony, painted fingers shoved him back into his seat, and Matt wondered absently why they weren't dead yet.

Somehow, he was drunk enough not to be scared.

_Do you want me to try..._

"People, Matt, people are always competing. My neighbor has a bigger house, so I need a faster car. My best friend has a better job than me, so I need a better fuck for a girlfriend."

"Boyfriend." Matt corrected, grinning, and Mello ignored him.

_...directing your life? _

"That country has more money, so we need a bigger army. That country has tanks, so we gotta build nukes."

A pause.

"That kid is smarter than me, so let's start an all-out war."

_The purest forms of life_

A second and Mello was in the lane for oncoming traffic. Two in the morning, and there _had_ to be a dented green pick-up coming straight for them.

"You see, Matt, it's about living…"

The truck's horn blared, and Mello's laugh echoed behind it.

_Our days are never coming back_

"…And in order to live…"

Grip iron-hard on the wheel. Mello wasn't moving.

"…You have to be ready to die."

Somehow, Matt wasn't too drunk not to close his eyes as the headlights shot blindingly close.

Last second, the pick-up swerved out of the way, driver screeching obscenities from behind smudged glass windows. Mello laughed, and after a while, pulled over.

_The cannons of our time..._

"Y'see, Matt, that guy… He's not living. He probably has a wife and kids, a decent job. He's not living. You haven't lived until you've smashed someone's windshield with a golf club, ripped the skin of your knuckles raw and bloody against the face of a guy who's twice your size. You haven't breathed until you're standing on top of the pile and they're licking your goddamn boots clean, because people live to compete, they know the only time they're not getting fucked in the ass is when they're the ones with their dicks out. You gotta blow up a building to show 'em that they're never gonna get you, point a gun in his face or pin him to a wall, hit him or kiss him until he cries because _it's the only way you get on top_. You know, Matt?"

_...Our days are never coming back..._

Pressed against the car door, bubble-drunk and heart skipping three beats at a time, Matt leaned forward and mumbled against Mello's lips, smiling.

"You're a crazy bitch."

A smirk.

"I _know_."

Matt felt the blonde slump against his shoulder, and that painted mouth presses faintly against his neck. He isn't into that, with guys, but it's Mello so he doesn't care.

_The purest forms of life...  
_  
Quiet and dark on the side of the highway, and in the here and now Matt steps out of the car and into the headlights. A circle of men in dark suits who seem eyeless with their black glasses and guns, and Matt doesn't care because he has words on his lips and he's ready to die.

_Our days are never, ever coming back._

"…Matt?"

Hand on his cheek, rough to touch and girl-thin.

"Yeah, Mel?"

"…I need another drink."

One million miles in the future he's being shot through the heart, the head, and he's falling.

Funny.

He almost feels it.

* * *

Nothing much else to say.  
A lot of that philosophy stuff is influenced by my reading Fight Club.  
And just my own ideas on things. 

Review review review.  
- Ashley


End file.
